Call for Public Participation in the Public Sector Information Security Policy

Kenya’s ICT Ministry is calling on the general public to participate in giving their views with regards to the Public sector information security policy. The policy, which was developed by the ministry is seeking to serve the operational policy, rather than the strategic needs of Government Ministries, Departments and Agencies. As such, it will seek to set up governance structures with the view of implementing information security in various government agencies. The policy will also serve as a guide for the implementation of information security with the view of mitigating risks emerging from infromation security incidents. It will also monitor and evaluate the implementation of information security within government agencies.

Basically, the govenment has come to a realization that there was a gap with its internal operations owing to the lack of a centralized information management policy. This decentralization not only posed a risk but was also a threat to government information. As such, the government came up with a policy which wil offer guidelines on implementation as well as outline how best to protect government data and information.

The Ministry of ICT is asking for the input from he public via email on ispolicy@information.go.ke. This will be the fast draft of the policy which has been developed in collaboration between the ministry with participatory contribution from universities, the private sector and civil society. The policy is available for download on the Ministry’s website for further reading and review.